Georgia boss Sagnol angrily hits out at claim his team selections are influenced by politics
GEORGIA MANAGER WILLY Sagnol lost his patience from the very opening question of his pre-match press conference ahead of tomorrow’s Euro 2024 clash with Portugal, in response to a question alleging his team selections have been influenced by politics.
A question posed from the floor queried whether Budu Zivzivadze’s lack of minutes at the tournament thus far was because of a “political” influence on Sangol’s selections.
Zivzivadze has spoken out against the controversial “foreign agents” bill which has been passed in the Georgian parliament in spite of mass demonstrations on the streets of Tbilisi. The bill requires any media outlet or NGO in Georgia that gets more than 20% of its funding abroad to register as “agents of foreign influence”, and is seen as the ruling Georgia Dream party pivoting the country towards Russia.
Zivzivadze publicly declared his opposition to the law, posting on Instagram, “No to Russia, Georgia’s way is in Europe with an accompanying photo of two boys draped in a Georgian flag and EU flag, facing up against police forces. “No one should thank me because I am saying what every Georgian should be saying,” he added.
Zivzavadze was in the spotlight again earlier this month, expressing support for the protests and criticising the police on a podcast. After the comments gained traction and were picked up by opposition media, the player asked for them to be taken down, explaining that he didn’t want to cause controversy before the tournament.
The president of the Georgian FA, meanwhile, is the former international Levan Kobiashvili, who is also a sitting MP for the Georgian Dream party.
Zivzivadze has played just five minutes of the tournament so far – as a substitute in the opening game against Turkiye – but Sagnol angrily denied this was because of political pressure.
“Budu is a part of the team, he came in against Turkiye for some minutes”, said Sagnol. “I made different choices against Czech Republic. For tomorrow it is still not decided.
“You said yourself it became very political. For me, I try to stay far from that. I want to take proper decisions based only on football. Fact.
It’s funny because I remember six, seven months ago I was insulted by a big amount of people when I was putting [striker Georges] Mikautadze on the bench, and when I was letting Budu play.
“And now I’m insulted, every day, by some twat – and I can say it, I say it again, twat – for absolutely no football reasons. And I can’t accept that any longer. I’m a football coach, I’m nothing else. That is clear to everyone. Who plays and who doesn’t play it’s my entire decision. That’s it.
“Sorry for the use of the term but I have not been in a good mood because of this for a couple of days now.”
Sagnol later added: “If I had to listen to every one of you then we would have to change the rules and play with 25 players on the pitch.”
Georgia need to beat Portugal in Gelsenkirchen tomorrow night to qualify for the last-16 of what is their first major tournament appearance.
Additional reporting by Paul Fennessy
